Defense

COLOGNE, Germany — The German government is pulling back two navy ships from the Gulf of Aden sent there weeks ago on stand-by to support an eventual post-war Strait of Hormuz security mission, as hope is fading in Berlin that the conflict in Iran will end anytime soon. Defense leaders ordered the mine hunter Fulda and the support vessel Mosel to redeploy from Djibouti, a European and…

VIENNA — The European Union has authorized its naval mission in the Indian Ocean to stop and board Russian shadow fleet tankers suspected of operating under false flags, the bloc announced on Wednesday. EU member states have authorized Operation Atalanta, the union’s counter-piracy naval mission off the Horn of Africa, to begin conducting flag-verification boardings of vessels suspected of…

FARNBOROUGH, England — BAE Systems revealed a new unmanned fighter jet on Wednesday, boosting Britain’s entry into one of the defense industry’s hottest and most fiercely contested markets. The U.K.’s biggest defense company showcased a model of its new jet, Brontanax, derived from the ancient Greek words for thunder and king, at the Farnborough Airshow. It is about the size of a Hawk…

LONDON — The weapon’s barrel points towards a drone in the sky. It briefly adjusts and then fires, with smoke rising where the round shoots. But instead of a service member resting a finger on the trigger well in preparation for the next shot, in video footage of the Bullfrog weapons system, a hulking, metal machine tilts the weapon just slightly, refocusing itself. As the U.S. contends with…